Ok I have a confession: I’m a gamer and have been for years. Games such as Ultima, Wing Commander, Monkey Island lit the flame of my passion for games that still burns strong today. However as games become more and more powerful and complex, a nagging feeling is eating at me. When I attempt to play a game like Ghost Recon or Rainbow 6 I feel like a stranger in a strange land. As Joe Webmaster, I have no frelling clue as to how to handle squad combat. How the hell am I suppose to know intuitively what tactics work and don’t?
I think games have matured to a wonderful point where they can be a valuable learning tool. A lot of these games do have in game tutorials, but for the most point these tutorials are centered around how to master the user interface more than anything else. I think what we need is more of a “Conquest” type learning experience. If you are not familiar with Conquest, it’s a show on the History channel where a team of people figure out the tactics used for particular weapons and then test those tactics. They recently had a show on Urban Operations, and as I’m watching it I’m thinking that this would be an awesome training for games such as Rainbow 6 or SWAT.
What do you think? Are the tutorials that come with games today good enough for your purposes? If you’ve mastered the art of squad combat or stealth tactics how did you do it? Was it by trial and error? Outside experience? Would you consider a lesson on tactics and strategy in a game to be a waste of time or valuable training?
I’ve had the same problem. I love playing Ghost Recon but can’t find a lot of info on tactics. I even tried looking up military stuff. It seems like the military doesn’t want these type of tactics to be easily available. (How’s that for a conspiracy theory?)
Some of the guide books, such as Prima, have basic tactics info.
Totall offtopic – I saw that episode of Conquest, and it was fantastic.
I’d read about how urban ops operate in teams, and how you have to trust each other totally, and how when entering a room each man has to cover a specific area.
But seeing it demoed on Conquest really brought it home. Peter Woodward, playing a terrorist, is standing on the right side of the room. And he tells the guy who is supposed to cover the left side of the room that even if you see me, you must not shoot me – your job is to cover the other side of the room and you have to trust that your teammate will shoot the bad guys on his side of the room.
Holy shit. I can’t imagine that kind of discipline and trust. If I busted into a room and noticed a guy pointing a gun at me, it would be really, really hard for me to deliberately ignore his presence and actually turn away from him.
The ‘intro’ scenarios to Fallout Tactics helped to give you some tactical planning. However, it was mostly basic stuff such as “put this guy on ‘shoot on sight’ mode and have the other guy lure the enemy around the corner” and “Have this guy snipe while the other rains grenades when they run from the bulilding.”
Now that I think of it, the diametric opposite to most tutorials in games would be for Commandos 2, in which there is no interface help. The first training mission (one screen in size) took me forty-five minutes because I had to play with the manual on the keyboard.
I haven’t broken into the small squad FPSes, but I think the same tactics that work early in X-Com (you know, before you get blaster bombs and mind control) should work fairly well in FPS squad games as well.
So short answer: go get X-Com (one of the Greatest Games Ever).
Dewey (your not a Car Talk fan are you?), thats what I’m asking about. If I had an interactive version of that episode to train for squad based games, then I think I would come out with a greater appreciation for the game play. I also think the game would be a lot more fun, since I would have a fighting chance at “doing the right thing ™”
Jack: I don’t think we have to go into military or police secrets for the training, just enough to give a person a good feel for the situation. Nothing more than what you would find say on the History channel.
And XCom is indeed one of the best games ever (right up there with Star Control 2). I wish I could get my copy to work on Windows XP. So far I haven’t had much luck.
don’t know if this will help you can read up on tactics with field manuals http://155.217.58.58/atdls.htm FM 7-8
INFANTRY RIFLE PLATOON AND SQUAD might be what your looking for
I seem to recall squad-based games usually having some sort of rudimentary training mode where you learn to use your squad, though that may depend on the game.
Where I learned most of my knowledge of tactics and such was watching shows like Cops and that episode of Conquest was on today–man, I think I love that show–and so on. When I was a kid, I was able to check out a SWAT team training manual from the local library, you may want to see about that. But most of these games are actually a whole different kettle of fish, because you have to take AI idiocy into account. I can’t tell you how many times my own guys flash-banged me in Sum of All Fears because their collision detection didn’t pick up that the door wasn’t opened juuuust right.
The best training I can think of is just playing the damn things.
Are we talking Single Player or Multi-Player?
If it were online MP, then I’d say it really doesn’t matter too much if you use good basic tactics. Just be quick on the mouse and you will be at least adequate. But to be a top squad, you have to use good team tactics. They practice a lot. I’ve been on the receiving end of a few squad practices and they can be very effective in goal-based games (Search and Destroy, King of the Hill, any flag based game). MP FPS are a lot like basketball. One highly skilled player on a team can give his team a significant advantage. A good tactical team (even if the individual players are not as good as the players on the other side) will win the day though.
[sub]Most of my experiences come from the Delta Force series of games. If you have been disappointed with the past games, you should give Black Hawk Down a chance. Its tons better than anything else in the series.[/sub]
You may also want to read through some walkthroughs for the game in question. It may ruin some of the suspense, but it’ll show you what you’re supposed to do, so you at least know that much. Also, some of the Red Storm games have a “suggested path” kinda thing, where you just follow the waypoints of the suggested route through the mission.
I guess from my point of view, I’m wondering if this type of training should be integrated within the game. Should the burden be on the player of the game to goto outside resources to learn the best ways of play? Or should it be on the game company to provide that material?
I’ll have to give Black Hawk Down a shot. Also, that field manual site is rather cool. Will have to do a little reading there.
If the game is ‘done right’ you should get a basic tutorial and then you should be able to ‘do things your own way’.
I dislike games where there is a ‘single solution’ or where you need to be an expert before you start playing in order to succeed - but then they’re just going to pigeon-hole themselves and not sell.
Ideally, you play through on ‘Normal’ skill where making mistakes and not using your men to their ‘best potential’ doesn’t matter so much - but that teaches you “the ropes” so you can then replay the game on a harder level and truly test your skills.
Some games (mostly Japanese ones) will watch your progress and - if they see you struggling - with offer a simpler skill level. Other games adapt their skill level to your playing talent - but that is often a bad idea as people don’t really learn if it just gets easier and easier.
It’s a hard balancing act for the developer tho - satisfying the experienced strategist whilst keeping the casual player’s attention as well - few games truly achieve it.
Probably worth considering that developers assume most players never read the manual tho - hence tutorials and hints are seldom omitted…
p.s. I truly believe that games should ‘simulate’ reality - and by that I mean create something which ‘seems’ realistic but in actual fact is bent and distorted so that it ‘plays well’.
Given the power/time/budgets available to developers - more and more ‘realism’ is being promised - but I’m not sure that isn’t missing the point…
Realism in a combat sim would be a bad thing - there MUST be a way to win - always - wheras in reality there isn’t
Oh, it should absolutely be on the game company. Each one does things their own way, so I think it’s their responsibility to acclimate you. Some form of basic training, just to figure out how to handle things, is mandatory IMHO. Now whether it should cover advanced squad tactics and such could be debated. Some people LIKE doing trial and error to figure out what works best in a given situation. I’m not one of em.
I agree that you should do things your “own way”, but on the other hand I think that knowledge of basic tactics would be invaluable in figuring out what your own way should be. For example in a football game, you have complete freedom to pick whatever play you like, but due to years of watching football you have a basic idea of what works and doesn’t. This knowledge allows you to make an informed decision towards how you play the game. I think thats what missing a lot of time with tactical squad games. I have no conceptual idea of what works and doesn’t, which leads more often than not to a dead squad.
As a corollary to this discussion, do you think that squad based games where you can be just as successful (or moreso) playing a 1 or 2 person team are flawed or not? With games like R6 or Jagged Alliances, I’ve had more success in taking a highly skilled character or two and just clearing out the map, and ignoring the “squad” aspect completly.
I had the same luck in quite a few of the Red Storm games, especially Ghost Recon. I found that I wound up doing everything ANYWAY, so I’d move my guys into a “cover” kinda position, then just run through the level and kill all the bad guys myself. They could do alright and frequently did, but sometimes it was just less hassle to go Rambo.
